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Smartphone Video Commando

The Self Sufficient Video Journalists

"Fuck, why didn't I think of this before!?" We all say that, at some point in our life and time. This blog post will make videography simple and highly effective for you gun addicts and creatives! First here's how we got hip to the sign language of video journalism. 10H Outfitters has been doing videography as a team for roughly 10 years. We bought a couple Canon Rebel T3i's and hacked Adobe Premiere editing platform for our PC's. Then in a "fail, forward, fast!" fashion we set out to learn from veterans and craftsmen. This was an effort to gain knowledge and quickly align our team with the elites in whatever subculture interested us at the time. These Legendary Craftsmen had countless years of experience, life, love, stress, and setbacks in their trade of choice. Once our team deployed on a video mission we set out to gain intel, video, and observe our subject in their natural creative habitat. We would film our subject in a tutorial manner and compose the project based on an interview we set forth. The interviews were based upon 25 solid questions. These questions were questions we wanted to know for ourselves. We could take that footage back and learn all over again after seeing the process live. This crash course workshop we would film; was enough fuel to the fight if we wanted to create our own product. Sounds like a dickhead move, but we were good friends with most of our subjects. Imagine this! A Lifetime of knowledge for a 10 minute vid- that took 10 hours to shoot, edit, and release is a winning formula!

Hardware + Software You Need

Let’s Begin

Invest in a good smart phone. Note that not all smart phones are created equally. iPhone, Android, and galaxy s6 and up, shoot in 4K HD quality. Worst case scenario 1080p. There's plenty of great tools in the form of apps. Apps broken down and simply put are user-friendly. There's no app that's out there that is highly intricate, hard, or over-detailed enough that you can't operate it!

When filming Rotate your camera landscape / widescreen. Make sure to change your settings to 4k or 1080p in your general settings on your phone.

You'll need an Octopus Tripod which is relatively cheap and effective. Grab some additional lenses for various situations which are optional; but it allows you to film Fisheye/Wide Angle/Macro/Telephoto Lens. Then look into getting a Stabilizer if you want to take it to the next level!

iMovie & Postproduction

Post-Production while using iMovie:

Make sure you have some good music. Pick your favorite tracks. Movie Soundtracks are the best for us. Hans Zimmer is a killer's killer!. Music and/or Narration is essential to a great product. It's kind of tricky to dance around copyright infringement when uploading to youtube, instagram, or vimeo. But! we found out your music has to be less than 30 seconds in duration that way they can't shazam you and take your video down. You can chop it up and use different songs just make sure your transitions are smooth like a dj.

Drag and Drop footage as you see fit. Don't get overwhelmed with anything. Just have a vision and use your fat fingertips to edit and scale down footage/pix/music.

Transitions are what creates flow. Get creative with it. We just use hard transition or dissolves most of the time.

Export to your camera roll when done. The cool thing about iMovie is you can always go back and edit, just don't delete your original files. It's like an oil painting that never dries, you can add as much as you'd like and your canvas will give you more depth.

It might run you a couple bucks for it. No more than $5.99 that's for sure. It's highly useful in the long run if you know your recording settings and want to import it into your computer platform to use with Final Cut Pro or Adobe Premiere.

Movie Looks: (optional)

You can complete an overlay with this app. It can make everything the same tone, colorway, creative filter.

Tactics to Succeed

Key Points to filming.

Use a Tripod or if handheld *Locked Wrist*

Film in 1 to 2 minute increments for logging and memory reasons.

Make sure your settings are at 4K and/or 1080p HD and learn about it.

Film in Slo-Mo, Timelapse, Regular Basic Video, whatever works for your vision.

Study your favorite Directors and use their tactics.

Video Intro is Essential to Any Campaign

Practice what you preach!

Yes this video was completed with a Smartphone, iMovie, and Tripod only! Along with a video Intro that we make for other companies at the beginning and end. This was my first attempt at making a video completely on an iPhone. I've been behind the camera for many years. So one day I decided to take film of a workout session doing performance based training. Taking 100 shots at the same exact corner on a hockey net.

GET AFTER IT!!

Let's see how cool your projects come out. Just put it out there in a "fail forward fast" fashion. If you haven't released anything it's already too late! That's how late you are. This blog post is a bit more for the Crisis Application Group. On the phone with the catch phrase human generator Jay Paisley he said "I'm retired man, I want to see how cool the rest of you guys are". As if we weren't cool enough already!? Ha! Furthermore, it's about going out there and doing it is what he meant by that.

Commandos need very little to operate.

But on the flipside!

Look into a Drone for Aerial Footage we reccomend the new DJI MAVIC Pro. Really this is probably the Coolest invention yet. It fits in your pocket and operates from your phone directly.

Go Pro Tactics are essential to getting gunfighter theatrics! You can go with any type of Go Pro. We highly recommend anything 3 and above as far as generations/versions are concerned.

We Make Custom Video Intros. Just click the graphic below!!!

Why get a video intro?

The importance of having an intro for any product, video production, or documentary is vital. It’s your brand! It’s your livelihood! These intros give your viewers an impact type feel. It generates suspense and excitement within 10 seconds just right before your visual work starts!